On which I write about the books I read, science, science fiction, fantasy, and anything else that I want to. Currently trying to read and comment upon every novel that has won the Hugo and International Fantasy awards.

Saturday, April 27, 1974

Comments: After winning the 1973 Best Novella Nebula for A Meeting with Medusa, Arthur C. Clarke followed up by winning the Best Novel Nebula in 1974 for what was probably his best book: Rendezvous with Rama. And after begin denied in 1972 and losing to "No Award" for Best Short Story, Gene Wolfe recovered and won the Best Novella Nebula in 1974 for The Island of Doctor Death.

But the real development of 1974 was the introduction of the Best Dramatic Presentation Nebula, designed to honor scriptwriters with the dystopian Soylent Green taking home the prize in this category's first year. Because the SFWA, which sponsors the Nebula Awards, is a writers' organization, the award is directed to the screenwriter, and sometimes to the novelist upon who an adapted work is based, rather than the producers of the film being honored.

Saturday, April 20, 1974

Comments: In 1974, the Campbell Award for Best Novel resulted in not one, but two ties, which is odd, because technically, there is only one award given. But because they track second (and usually third) place finishers rather than simply list all of the shortlisted but non-winning nominees (like most other awards do), the award found itself with a tie for both first and second place.

The other odd thing about the 1974 Campbell Awards is that the judges saw fit to hand out an award for Best Nonfiction Book, which went to Carl Sagan's The Cosmic Connection. As with Silverberg's 1973 Special Award for Writing Excellence for his novel Dying Inside the year, this award category seems to have had no precedent at the Campbell Awards, and the category has not been repeated, making its appearance in this year all the more mystifying.

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